A team of researchers at Weill Cornell Medical College has discovered that amyloid peptides are harmful to the blood vessels that supply the brain with blood in Alzheimer's disease -- thus accelerating cognitive decline by limiting oxygen-rich blood and nutrients. In their animal studies, the investigators reveal how amyloid-ß accumulates in blood vessels and how such accumulation and damage might be ultimately prevented. Their study, published in the Feb. 4 online edition of the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS), is the first to identify the role that the innate immunity receptor CD36 plays in damaging cerebral blood vessels and promoting the accumulation of amyloid deposits in these vessels, a condition known as cerebral amyloid angiopathy (CAA).